The anionic clay, zinc hydroxy nitrate was found to selectively intercalate fluoride ions from a mixture of halide ions and chloride ions from a mixture of chloride, bromide and iodide ions. In a binary mixture of chloride and bromide ions, the selectivity for chloride ions was very high (94%) even when the bromide concentration was eight times in excess. The selectivity was achieved in both concentrated and dilute salt solutions. The trend in selectivity observed here is different from what has been observed for layered double hydroxides. (C) 2011 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.